Friday, May 1, 2009

may day


in the early 80's i lived on the greek island of naxos for a year with my young family. in greece, may 1st is a national holiday. it celebrates the beginning of good weather (which actually means no rain until november!). on may first, women and children go to the hills and pick wild flowers and make wreathes (stafani) to hang on the doors of their friends. i remember picking wild cyclamen and lavender and hanging our wreath on the door of an elderly couple we had befriended. now that's a way to bring on spring!

2 comments:

Taos Sunflower said...

What a wonderful tradition. Kind of like practicing random acts of kindness. We certainly have nothing like that (that I can think of) in the US.

angella said...

i agree with TaosS :) traditions are lacking slightly here in Canada too, unless you start some yourself :)

spring- fertility, the feminine, the grace and generosity of it all makes me happy to just be able to breathe in the (finally)warm winds blowing over the lake and smell the green-stuff breaking thru the browness that covers the forest floor.